[Funded] Flash Free Visitor Maps for Piwik

--- UPDATE, March: we have now released the super awesome secret feature: Piwik Real Time Visitors map. We got much positive feedback from the community from the new World and Country Maps and we can only thank our pledgers (see the full list below!) for their wonderful support.

--- UPDATE, Jan 7th: we have reached the funding target but still appreciate your pledges a lot! If we can raise more, we will work on a super awesome secret feature involving Maps that you will love and benefit from when using Piwik! Please support the project now!

Using SVG+JS+HTML5, we will be removing the last Flash hold-out in the Piwik interface. We are working to create beautiful Maps to show your Visitors at a level we could never do before. The map will show a World map, but you can click to zoom on any region of the world to access Country level statistics. Click in any country and view detailed Country maps, right down to Regions and Cities! It will be all pure SVG+JS. Did we mention no flash?

We have already spent weeks of work on these new Maps for Piwik. Below are some screenshots of the feature in action.

We need your help to finish the development. Help fund this most significant new feature and enjoy beautiful maps in Piwik!

For more information click on the FAQs below, or check out the Project Updates. To fund the feature, select your amount and click on the right.

+The Project FAQ's

Q- What functionality will be delivered?
A- Once the funding objective is reached, within a few weeks we will release a new plugin UserCountryMap. This plugin will display the World + Detailed country maps as a new widget in the Dashboard, and will also display the map in Visitors>Location report.

The maps will show the Visits, Actions, Bounce rate, Average time on site, for all countries, but also the new reports: visitors by Region and by City.

A button lets you change from Country to the detailed Region or City views, or you can click on any visible country to load the regions, or you can use the select list of continents and countries for quick access to a particular name.

The maps are fast, usable, and easy to gain insights and navigate. We are using smart color scales for metrics reporting.

Q- Will the maps show regions and cities in all Countries?
A- The maps will work for all countries where there is GeoIP data available. If you see Cities and Regions in your Visitors > Location report, they will appear on the maps!

Q- Why new Maps for Piwik?
A- Piwik currently has a map widget but it is limited, and requires the flash plugin. Flash has had too many security issues, and does not work on many devices. The new maps will be using open standards (svg, js, css) and will work on most modern devices. But of course the ultimate goal is make these maps much better by adding the ability to get Region stats, and Cities stats!

Q- Who is implementing the Maps?
A- We are working with Gregor Aisch to create the new maps. Gregor is a talented and renowned Usability and Data Visualisation Engineer based in Germany.

Q- Why should I fund this project?
A- If you believe in open source, and ensuring that we can continue to provide a quality product in the future, your funding will help make this possible so that our amazing, passionate and hard-working team (who are often unpaid!) can make this feature a priority.

Q- Is it really that hard to build pretty maps?

A- It is hard to build world maps using open source technologies. We have decided to work on this project from scratch, simply because as of 2012 December, there was no free software library that would let us Draw Maps of cities and regions. As passionate software engineers believing in open source, we decided to go ahead and Gregor is built one of the first Open Source Mapping library. Piwik will actually be the first project worldwide to release Region and City level mapping under a fully free software license!

Q- What are the available payment methods?
A- We accept Visa, MasterCard, Diners Club, Discover and PayPal. We use PayPal to securely process all our payments including credit card payments. PayPal is one of the worlds leading merchant gateway and they will securely handle all credit card operations on their secure servers. Also your email address will not be shared or published.

Q- What do the perks (in the right column) mean?
A- When you make a pledge for this feature, not only will you participate in the feature development and make it available sooner, but you will also get an extra perk based on your donation level (or several perks!). Check out this page to learn exactly what the perks mean.

We need your support to achieve this noble goal.

+Updates

The project's progress has stalled hence why we are starting this important crowdfunding campaign to get the Maps finished! We need your help with additional funding to get it completed.

We are serious about this project and have taken the challenge with an open minds. Building accurate and beautiful maps using open data and open source tech is a wonderful technical challenge. Gregor has also blogged about his data/dev research and findings in a few blog posts: